Deep, Drunk, Meaningful Conversations
by BitterRenegade
Summary: It's kind of funny, the things you talk about when you're drunk.


Heres a shout out to my buddy for a certain line.

~*~  
Deep, Drunken, Meaningful Conversations  
~*~

After the little vault hunter, Gaige, brought me a shit ton of rakk ale, I thought it'd be only fair to share some with the kid. Really, she looked like she could use a drink just as much as I did. Plus she gave it to me instead of that bitch Moxxi, so… yeah. Of course, at the time I hadn't known that she hadn't had much experience drinking. But then, Zero really should have told me that before the two of us sat on the roof of the Crimson Raider's HQ passing a bottle back and forth.

"You know, Roland was the coolest dude in the universe man. Like, so cool! He was like the coolest guy I'd ever known." The red head slurred, passing the bottle to me. I took a swig of it, smiling.

"Damn straight." I replied, agreeing. Roland was one of the few people in the universe that I didn't think was completely stupid.

However her drunken cheerfulness was almost instantly replaced with solemn whispers "I'm going to kill Jack, if it's the last fucking thing that I do. H-he killed-"

Praying to gods that I didn't even believe existed, I raised the bottle to her lips "You need to get more of that rakk ale in your system, kiddo." I told her simply, hoping she wouldn't finish that sentence.

Gaige nodded, chugging the drink.

We sat in silence for a moment before I spoke up again "…So how'd you end up on Pandora?"

The teenager laughed "Bad luck. But hell, we all get that."

I chuckled, taking the bottle for another drink "Happens to the best of us, little one."

"So what are you going to do to Jack?" Gaige asked me, curious. My mood darkened considerably, but I took her question seriously.

"Asshole's going to pay for what he did to Blood and Roland and…"

Lilith.

Pretty much sensing what I was feeling, what I was thinking, the girl spoke up "We're going to save Lilith, so don't worry about that." Gaige told me, a confident expression on her face as she wobbled slightly.

"We better." I muttered, before the two of us continued to discuss anything that came to mind. The other vault hunters, Pandora, about a million different ways to kill Jack. An hour later I could tell that the youngest vault hunter was half-dead with exhaustion and drunkenness, and had been ready to tell her that she should probably get her ass to bed. That idea was thrown in the trash when I felt the girl rest her head on my shoulder, causing me to nearly jump back in surprise.

"…'m real sorry 'bout everything that's been happenin'." She mumbled, dozing off, breath smelling strongly of the ale we'd been drinking. I held back a smile, not bothering to shake the girl awake as she mumbled about how cool me and the other vault hunters were.

Sighing, I picked the girl up and headed back inside. Zero sat against the wall, standing as soon as we entered and glancing at the little vault hunter in my arms. "Girl can't hold her liquor for shit." I explained, the assassin nodding and taking her from me gently.

"She makes up for it  
With her big heart and kindness,  
Thing's that we need, now."

Snorting, I shook my head "Whatever you say, vault hunter." I grinned "Kid's going to pay for all that rakk ale in the morning. Didn't know she was such a lightweight."

"Compared to you, we  
Are all considered lightweights."

The assassin paused.

"She doesn't drink much."

Oh, so that's why she was out after almost a bottle. "Well, at least she isn't a crazy drunk." Like Maya, I wanted to add, but held my tongue.

Zero nodded, a smiley emoticon flashing on his mask as he went to take Gaige to the home that they shared with the other vault hunters. Once he'd reached the door, however, he turned towards me.

"She worries for you.  
She worries for all of us.  
Don't die on her, too."

I froze, somewhat surprised. I supposed that I should have noticed how quickly she had grown attached to all of us. It was obvious that she'd considered all of us Crimson Raiders, Vault Hunters… as some sort of makeshift family. Bloodwing had hit her hard, not as hard as her death hit me of course, but still. And Roland had been just as much of a father to her as Axton, although I did see her talk to Roland much more. And Lilith… well, Gaige had told me earlier in the evening how the siren was high up on her list of people she loved to hang with. Plus, she was still just a kid. She could care less about the deaths of bandits or monsters that roamed Pandora, but the death of her friends…

"I don't plan on it." I told Zero, "Because we're going to save Lilith and kill Jack, because the heroes always win, right? It'd be a pretty bad story if we ended up dyin' too."


End file.
